THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, December 25, 1994 TAG: 9412230268
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 18 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ELIZABETH THIEL, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 58 lines
After protest all but sank an attempt to shift attendance zones to relieve some elementary and middle school crowding, the School Board vowed last year not to try it again.
But now, with four new members, the board is preparing to consider boundary changes once more.
Along with the shifts, the board is reviewing other ways to relieve schools that are more than 10 percent over capacity - 23 of the city's 52 elementary schools, six of the 13 middle schools and five of the 10 high schools.
Specifics won't be available until next month.
But among the measures being considered is the continued use of portable classrooms. That's a departure from the philosophy of the past three years under Superintendent Sidney L. Faucette, who vowed to stop using portables.
On the elementary school level, school planners recommend moving about 360 students from Glenwood to Rosemont Forest and Salem. About 48 students from North Landing also would be moved to Salem, while 85 students would leave Salem to attend Landstown.
Planners also asked that Ocean Lakes, Red Mill, Strawbridge, Thalia, Trantwood and Woodstock elementaries be considered for additions in next year's capital improvement plan. Brookwood, Cooke, Hermitage, Indian Lakes and Kempsville Meadows, which are expected to have minimal enrollment growth in the next few years, would continue to rely on portable classrooms.
Along with a new elementary school scheduled to open on Holland Road in 1997 and additions already scheduled for 10 schools - Holland, Princess Anne, Alanton, John B. Dey, Kings Grant, Bettie F. Williams, Kingston, Point O'View, Plaza and College Park - the measures would mean that all elementary schools would be under the 10 percent crowding level by the year 2000, said Kenneth B. Lumpkin, the school system's demographer.
On the middle school level, Lumpkin proposes diverting students in the Rosemont Elementary zone into the new Larkspur Middle boundary. Those students now feed into Plaza and Landstown. Along with additions scheduled in 1996-97 for Plaza and Landstown, the shift would put the two schools under capacity.
There is a problem, however. Princess Anne Middle School is expected to be severely crowded until 1998, when a new middle school will open in the Corporate Landing area. In the meantime, shifting Princess Anne Middle's boundary to relieve the crowding would be extremely difficult, Lumpkin said, because of the way the zones now are configured.
Lumpkin recommended monitoring the Princess Anne situation through 1997.
Lumpkin proposed no boundary shifts for high schools. All the crowded ones - Bayside, First Colonial, Kempsville, Princess Anne and Salem - are being relieved by classroom additions over the next few years and the opening of a new high school south of Salem in 1999.
Lumpkin will bring more details, such as which neighborhoods would be affected by attendance zone shifts, to the Jan. 17 School Board meeting. A public hearing is tentatively scheduled for Feb. 23. by CNB